¡ATERRADOR! Aldeas fantasmas con mansiones vacías: ¿Dónde está todo el mundo?

Terrifying! Ghost villages with intact mansions. Where did everyone go? Tourist crisis in China. Sanjia Baxia and aggressive guides in Jiucaigu. Danger in Chinese electric cars. Defective airbags in the giant of 100 billion. Shocking images and reports have emerged from multiple provinces in China, showing entire abandoned villages, intact homes with personal belongings untouched, but without a trace of their residents. While Chinese authorities remain silent, citizens are raising the alarm. A growing number of online publications states that 2025 has brought an unprecedented wave of death, with many pointing to a disturbing pattern, a high number of young adults, particularly those born in the 1980s and 1990s, dying suddenly and without a clear cause. Many symptoms are similar to those of COVID-19, but are ruled out as minor diseases until it is too late. Several reports mention cases that become serious lung conditions, commonly known as white lung, and that lead to sudden death, especially among healthy people and in working age. In Xinjiang Henan, a local resident told several young members of the Communist Party who died unexpectedly. Online data showing high mortality rates among millennials triggered an intense public debate, especially because the reported mortality rates for people born in the 1980s and 1990s are 5.2% and 3% respectively. Authorities responded by denying the statements and punishing those who spread them. However, users continued to share personal accounts, some pointing to screens of local funerals listing several young people between 14 and 31 years old among the recently deceased. A resident of Choukou, Henan, described waves of death from fever, pneumonia and heart or brain complications. Overcrowded hospitals could not cope, which led many to die at home. He stated that the burials replaced cremations, as families struggled with funeral costs, and even government officials looked fat. He added that almost all the villages in his region, with hundreds or thousands of residents, have seen a significant loss of lives, particularly among young people. No one is questioning what is happening. He said, this feeling of emptiness is not only rural. Urban areas feel disturbingly empty. Shops, streets and shopping centers are notably deserted. While some attribute this to the return of migrant workers after the closure of factories, the countryside also shows signs of massive disappearance. A blogger who traveled through Henan discovered entire neighborhoods of modern houses covered in debris and debris. Inside, the rooms remained clean and supplied, but the doors were half-open, suggesting a sudden and unplanned departure. Images of the village of Hulusao in Tengchou show houses of several abandoned floors. An elderly resident, one of the barely 16 remaining homes of a peak of more than 400 people, confirmed the massive exodus, and this is not limited to Hunan. Similar ghost villages have been identified in Hubei, Henan, Hebei, Guangxi and Yunnan, in an area that once housed more than 10,000 people, now barely 10 families remain. The buildings show sealed doors, welded with steel plates. Some question whether the Chinese population is still close to 1.4 billion officials. A widely shared statistic feeds speculation. According to a Japanese analysis based on data from the Chinese industry, the gross salt production in China fell by 25% between 2019 and 2022, a possible indicator revealing a reduced demand linked to a population decline. The Chinese tourist sector is facing a serious crisis. Formerly popular destinations such as Sanya in the province of Hainan are now seeing a sharp drop in the number of visitors. Hotels and guest houses are cutting prices to attract customers, but reservations are still scarce. Industry experts point out that this slowdown has two main causes. First, the economic recession in China is leading people to adjust their budgets and travel less. Second, years of tourist exploitation in cities like Sanya have damaged public trust. An online comment summed it up. China's tourism industry has destroyed itself. For Gong Tongmu, who has managed a guest house boutique in Sanya for more than a decade, the change is shocking. In previous years, prices have been constantly rising from November to the Chinese New Year. Now, prices are starting to drop every day, sometimes between 30 and 50 yuan. The rooms that used to be rented for 300 to 400 yuan are now struggling to sell, even to 100. The reputation of Sanya has been affected by reports of abuse of tourists. A viral story involves a visitor who, while diving, was pressured by an instructor to pay extra for a full face mask. When denied, the instructor allegedly submerged him by force, forcing him to pay 300 yuan to avoid further inconvenience. However, another 300 for underwater photos. More cases have come to light. In November 2023, a tourist named Azra Cheng visited Sanya with her extended family. Her stay in a village included a free yacht trip, during which four family members went diving. Despite rejecting offers to buy photos, the divers reported that their masks were removed by force underwater until they agreed to buy the package of photos. Aggressive sales are not limited to the coast. In the scenic area of ​​Yushaigu, Sichuan, tourists on a group tour claimed to have been abandoned at temperatures below zero after refusing to buy in a designated store. A traveler, the man. Huang said that the tourist bus stopped in a remote area with temperatures below zero. The guide demanded that he sign an exemption form and leave the group for not cooperating with the purchases. When he refused and asked to stay with the group without being forced to spend, the guide contacted the tour company and blamed him for influencing the entire group. After being left in the cold for more than 20 minutes, the trip resumed without the guide, who gave up halfway through. The group completed the itinerary without more forced purchases. These incidents have generated serious concerns about consumer rights and the ethics of tourist practices in China. Is this just a temporary slowdown or a deeper crisis for an industry that for a long time has been criticized for putting profits ahead of people? Once acclaimed as the future of transport, the electric vehicle industry or new energy vehicles, China's NEV, is now plunged into a crisis. A viral video shows rows of intact electric vehicles, some still wrapped in plastic, abandoned in fields covered with weeds. They were all registered in 2019. Today they remain unused. Vehicles practically new, discarded as garbage. This disturbing image is a clear symbol of a collapsing industry. In January 2025, monthly sales of electric vehicles in China plummeted. Many companies reported falls above 50%. Of the more than 20 major manufacturers of electric vehicles that had increased production in the last decade, only 8 remain standing. Industry giants like Vuelve M Motor, Singulato and Byton have broken or disappeared without a trace. This collapse is not only economic, but structural. For years, the boom in electric vehicles in China was driven not by market demand, but by state subsidies and political agendas. In 2014, the Chinese government declared the NEV as a priority and allocated billions for its production. Local governments joined in, offering land, factories and tax exemptions to attract new companies. With the entry of Tesla into the Chinese market and the increase in consumer awareness, enthusiasm exploded. But it was not sustainable. Once international tariffs hardened and internal overproduction led to brutal price wars, the bubble burst. This is added to a broader economic slowdown and growing concerns about the quality of vehicles, which led the industry to decline. Take WM Motor as an example. Once it was only behind BYD in national sales. It raised more than 40 billion yuan in investment. Today, its offices are abandoned, its vehicles are not sold, and its former customers struggle to find insurance or spare parts. Then there is massive depreciation. An ES8 ring that cost more than 600,000 yuan a few years ago now barely reaches 100,000 yuan in the second-hand market if someone buys it. A Li Auto, which once cost 350,000 yuan, is now below 100,000 yuan. Why such a dramatic fall? First, the base was unstable. China's NEV sector was not built on market demand, but on central planning. As economist David Huang points out, even the term new energy vehicle is unique to China, used to disguise production and exaggerate climate statistics. Second, the quality has not improved. Customers now report terrifying failures, airbags that do not unfold during high-speed crashes, vehicles that break down in weeks after purchase, and chassis that rust in less than three years. An owner of an EV Xiaomi said his car crashed in the center of Shenzhen, and roadside assistance never arrived, despite two calls and more than an hour of waiting. In short, consumers feel deceived. China's NEV sector faces a setback. Once the pride of national policy and symbol of ecological progress, now runs the risk of becoming another warning story about what happens when politics exceeds performance. As the dream of a clean electric future gives way to the broken bench and broken promises, the real question now is, can trust be restored?